DESIGN 100: The People Shaping our World

Hervé Descottes, Lighting Designer

Hervé Descottes, Lighting Designer

In just the last year, lighting designer Hervé Descottes’s company, L’Observatoire International, has lit buildings by Frank Gehry, Steven Holl and Diller Scofidio + Renfro. But the real proof of his skill is what he did with a water treatment plant in Brooklyn (shown here)—draping the structure (by Polshek Partnership Architects) in a haze of bluish light. Next up: His lighting for the High Line, Manhattan’s linear park on the old West Side elevated tracks, where Descottes’s fixtures will brighten paths, people and plantings—while keeping the night sky dark (LObsIntl.com).—Fred A. Bernstein

MMA Architects, South Africa

MMA Architects, South Africa

A $6,000 house? The secret is in the sandbags. MMA Architects, headed by Luyanda Mpahlwa and Mphethi Morojele, conceived this dwelling, which won the 10 x 10 Housing Project award at Design Indaba, South Africa’s premier design expo. One of the country’s few black-owned architecture firms, MMA has been crucial to postapartheid reconstruction (CurryStoneDesignPrize.com).—Katherine Lagomarsino